


A Knotted Cord Untying

by elrhiarhodan



Category: Ed (US TV), The Flash (TV 2014), The Flash - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Betrayal, Doppelganger, F/M, Family, Forgiveness, Friendship, Fusion, Grief, Time Travel, not crack, time paradox
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-26
Updated: 2016-01-26
Packaged: 2018-05-16 07:48:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5820184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elrhiarhodan/pseuds/elrhiarhodan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Time is not a looped ball of string.  Time is not a straight line.  Time might be a tangled knot, unless time is simply an illusion.</p><p>Or, what happens when Harrison Wells finds a copy <i>his</i> biography at the annual Stuckeyville Library Book Sale.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Knotted Cord Untying

**Author's Note:**

> **Spoilers** : 1.17 (Tricksters), All of Season 2, especially 2.09 (Running to a Stand Still), 2.10 (Potential Energy)
> 
> I'm really kind of shocked that no one has done this yet, fused _Ed_ with _The Flash_ , but there's always a first time for craziness. And a quick primer if you don't know anything about that show. Ed was a New York lawyer on track for the big leagues, when he screwed up a contract he drafted, misplacing a single comma. He was fired and went home to find his wife in bed with a mailman, so he took a trip back to his hometown of Stuckeyville, Ohio. And bought the local bowling alley. That's all you need to know.
> 
> Many thanks to theatregirl7299 for her cheerleading and encouragement and advice, in addition to her fabulous beta work. Also, thanks to SuperSnowstorm Jonas for keeping me inside for two days straight.
> 
> Title from the Peter Gabriel song, _Blood of Eden_.

“Hey there, Harry.” Alan Stevens, the manager of the local hardware store, waved at him from across a pile of old Westerns. “Not surprised to find you here. You being all intellectual and like.” 

Interrupted from his desultory perusal of the offerings at this year's library book sale, Harrison Wells sighed and waved back. "Good to see you, Alan."

For fifteen years – as long as he and Tess had lived in Stuckeyville – Alan insisted on calling him Harry. Everyone here in Stuckeyville called him Harry, despite the fact that he hated being called Harry. His name was Harrison. It was his father's name, his grandfather's name and his great-grandfather's name. He didn't include the generational signifier, preferring the initials Ph.D., instead.

Tess, of course, thought it mildly amusing that he insisted being called Harrison, considering how much he'd loathed his father and all of the generations that came before. But when he tried to explain, she just shushed him with a kiss.

Tess was good like that. She got him. She got his crazy flights of fancy, his dreams, his hopes, his coping mechanisms. She grounded him, too. When he'd lost everything, she let him sulk for two weeks over the ruins of a once-promising career, and then picked him up, dusted him off, and told him that he could either spend the next twenty years trying to rebuild his reputation – and she'd stick by him if that was what he wanted – or he could do something meaningful. Like teach.

He'd asked her, "Why do you want to stay with me?"

She stroked his cheek, bristly with two weeks of unshaven beard, and simply said, "I love you, Harrison Wells. Not your reputation, not your academic trajectory. I love _you_."

"But your career? Being tied to me will poison your own promise."

Tess had shrugged. "I don't care about that. I care about you."

Back then, Harrison hadn't been convinced that Tess was making the right choice. Fifteen years later, he still wondered. 

And yet, there were here in Stuckeyville because of Tess. Her father had owned the bowling alley and left the property to Tess when he'd died. Instead of closing it down and selling the land to some faceless corporation that would throw up another unneeded strip mall, they kept it going, making it a social centerpiece, a place for everyone in town to come to and hang out. Tess, sweet and brilliant, managed it, while he did his best to teach high school physics.

The first years were hard – not for Tess, who seemed to relish living in her hometown, amongst family and old friends – but for him. He'd never been a natural communicator, and teaching a subject he loved at such a basic level to children who mostly couldn't care less wasn't a good combination. What happened in Starling City changed him; he had become harsh and acerbic, and had quickly earned the reputation for being the meanest teacher at Stuckeyville High.

He'd gotten warnings about that. But he'd also gotten results, too. By the third year, he had a student make the final round of the Intel Science Talent Search and there was at least one every year since. Prestige triumphed personality, apparently.

Harrison wouldn't say that he ever really warmed to people in Stuckeyville, nor they to him, but Tess disagreed. "They like you, Harrison. You just don't want to see it."

He grumbled, "If they liked me, they would respect my wishes and not call me Harry."

Tess had just laughed and kissed him. 

"Whatcha looking for?" To Harrison's dismay, Alan picked up an enormous pile of paperbacks and joined him.

He replied, "Nothing in particular. Just thought I'd stop by and see if I can find something interesting."

"Wife says we're supposed to support the library, so I'm buying back the books I donated last year." Alan proudly displayed a few dozen moldering Zane Grays.

Harrison nodded and made an effort to be sociable. "Looks like you had enjoyed those already."

"And I'll enjoy them again." Alan clapped him on the shoulder. "Will I see you tonight at the Bowl-a-Thon?" 

"Yeah. Wouldn't miss it for the world." Which was kind of true. He actually loved bowling, and Tess thought that made perfect sense. Bowling, after all, was physics.

Alan left and Harrison continued to sort through books. The odds of finding anything that would catch his interest were slim to none, but he really didn't have anything else to do for the next few hours. It was Homecoming Weekend in Stuckeyville, hence the Library book sale and the Bowl-a-Thon at the Stuckeybowl, which was another fundraiser. Tomorrow was the big parade, the carnival was opening and then football and a bonfire. Such was life in a small town in middle America.

There was nothing in the so-called "science" section other than too many copies of that asshole Hawkings' books, and he moved over to the biographies. Lots of books about faded celebrities and failed sports stars, not to mention politicians past and present. He was surprised to find both the first and second volumes of Blanche Wiesen Cook's biography of Eleanor Roosevelt, and set them aside for purchase. 

Almost ready to leave, Harrison spotted yet another copy of _A Brief History of Time_ and was tempted to buy it, if just to toss into tomorrow night's bonfire. Instead, he casually let it fall to the ground, where it landed next to a thick tome that was missing its book jacket. That one, he rescued.

Had the sun been just a little lower, or if a passing cloud had obscured the light, Harrison Wells' life in Stuckeyville would have continued to much as it had for the last decade and a half. He would have remained a man mostly content with his life, mostly reconciled to his mistakes; a man who only occasionally still dreamed about making his Nobel Prize acceptance speech.

But no clouds marred the deep blueness of the October sky or obscured the bright sunshine that made the words imprinted on the rescued book's cloth binding glitter and catch his eye.

Words that read, _Harrison Wells – A Biography_.

At first, he thought it was some kind of joke, even as he opened the cover and started reading the table of contents. There were chapters about his early years, his matriculation at MIT when he was fourteen, his acceptance at Princeton's Institute for Advanced Studies at twenty, his work in particle physics. But what gave him pause (okay, almost a heart attack), was the chapter titled, _S.T.A.R. Labs – The Birth of a Dream_.

There were only two people in the universe who knew about S.T.A.R. Labs – Tess and himself. They'd dreamed it up one beautiful autumn day, sitting on the beach. It was to be their baby – a laboratory where life-changing technologies would become real. But fate – in the form of a highly flawed thesis, a misplaced comma, and questionable work by his research assistants – intervened. S.T.A.R. Labs existed only as a sketch on a napkin, tucked away somewhere safe from anyone else's prying eyes.

Except that it wasn't. If this book was real, someone had stolen his name and his dreams and had made them a reality.

"Hey there, Harry – find anything interesting?" Carol, one of his fellow teachers, was carrying a pile of books.

He closed the book with deliberate care and picked up the two volumes he'd selected earlier. "Just a couple of biographies."

Carol tilted her head and read the spines. "Eleanor Roosevelt – good choice, although I remember reading something about those – that they are kind of controversial."

"Oh?"

"The author says that she was …" Carol leaned in close and whispered, "a lesbian."

Harrison smiled and whispered back, "She was."

Carol turned bright red and giggled. 

Anxious to deflect attention from the other book in his hand, he asked her about her own selections.

"Oh, mostly some books to stock my classroom library. I'm always trying to get the kids to read more." 

He tolerated her chatter for a few more minutes and excused himself. "Tess is expecting me at the bowling alley – needs my help getting things set up for tonight."

"Right, for the Bowl-a-Thon – the highlight of the weekend, as far as I'm concerned." Carol was the anchor for the team that had won the Stuckeyville High teachers' league championship the last three years running.

"Yeah – so, I need to pay for these and get going. See you tonight." Harrison backed away from his co-worker as quickly as he could without seeming too rude.

Thankfully, Carol didn't follow him to the cashier, but continued to dig through the piles. A few other people greeted him, but they didn't stop to chat, and he made it to the cashier without interruption.

"Hey there, Harry. Thanks for supporting the library." Mrs. Vanacore, who'd been Tess' third grade teacher – and reminded Harrison of nothing so much as a puffed-up pigeon – was in charge of the cash box. "Just the three hardcovers? And one without the jacket – that'll be two-fifty. Can't do better than that, can you?"

He pasted a smile on his face, relieved that the woman didn't insist on examining his purchases. He pulled a five out of his wallet. "Keep the change – it's for a good cause. And nope, I don't need a bag."

"Okay, then. We'll see you tonight, at the Bowl-a-Thon, right?"

Harrison tried not to sigh in irritation, "Of course you will. Tess will be delighted to see you, too. She always says you were her favorite teacher."

Mrs. Vanacore cooed and he regretted his words as she started going on about her years as a teacher. Thankfully, a few kids were behind him waiting to pay, and Harrison was able to make his escape to his car.

He tossed the two Eleanor Roosevelt biographies on the passenger seat and opened up _his biography_.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

For the first time in a very long time, Joe had an uninterrupted stretch of four hours at the station. No call outs, no emergencies, no disasters – natural or unnatural. It seemed like the entire population of Central City was behaving today. 

Which was good, since he was once again without a partner to help handle the paperwork. Not that he was the type to shove the less attractive parts of the job onto other people, but without a partner to split the work, it tended to pile up.

He had liked Patty. She had great promise, both as a cop and as someone who would make Barry happy. But he understood why she left, and maybe a tiny part of him was glad, too. She was a distraction for Barry, and right now, distractions were far too dangerous. If he was cold-hearted, he'd have to say that if she'd stayed in Central City, if Barry told her the whole truth, the odds of her long-term survival were pretty grim. She'd already been kidnapped by two meta-humans. Wasn't the third time supposed to be the charm?

No, as much as he hated seeing Barry broken-hearted, he didn't want to see Patty torn apart by Zoom, either. 

He refocused on the paperwork and just as he entered the data on the last overdue report and get ready to clock out, he got a call from the front desk – probably a call-out, but hopefully not for a meta-related crime. "Detective West speaking."

"Joe, it's Sergeant Watson – can you come out here?"

"What's the matter?" Watson, who was one of the most level-headed cops he knew, sounded completely freaked. Which probably meant it _was_ a meta-human problem. 

"There's a dead man here. And his wife."

Joe didn't ask any more questions. He just pulled out Cisco's latest version of The Boot and headed to the lobby.

Where he found Harrison Wells, wearing an old gray sweater with patches on the elbows, a blue button-down shirt and worn jeans. At his side was a lovely middle-aged woman. Both of them were standing with their hands in the air – the entire CCPD had their guns trained on them.

Captain Singh said, "Joe, you told us that Harrison Wells was dead."

The man wearing Harrison Wells' face snapped. "I'm not dead." 

The woman added, "My husband isn't dead."

Joe had no idea what to say, what to do. If this woman was Harrison Wells' wife, she was dead, too. He'd seen the accident and autopsy reports from the accident, and the woman standing here bore a remarkable resemblance to the face he'd seen in the photos. 

"Tess Morgan?"

"Yes, I am – I was. Morgan was my maiden name. Do you know me?"

Joe shook his head. "No, we haven't met before, but I know of you."

"Do you know my husband?" She reached out, but then seemed to remember the mass of guns pointed at her.

"Yes, I do."

"Except that I don't know you." Wells snapped.

Joe motioned for everyone to lower their weapons. For his part, he lowered The Boot, but didn't turn it off. If these two were meta-humans about to go on a rampage, this might be the only way to stop them. Using his best hostage-negotiation voice, he suggested, "Let's go into the conference room, okay? Talk privately, okay?"

Tess asked, "What's your name?" 

"Joe West." He waited to see if that got a reaction. It didn't. "Come, let's talk in private."

He relieved the man who called himself Harrison Wells of an overstuffed messenger bag, and got a rather pointed glare for his effort, then he took them to the small conference room. It was one that often did double duty as an interrogation room because it lacked exterior windows. A uniformed office trailed behind. As the mysterious pair sat down, he asked, "Can I get you anything? Water? Coffee?"

The woman, Tess, smiled and asked for water. "Wells" – and Joe couldn't help but mentally add quotation marks around the name – declined with a surly "no thanks". Joe signaled to the uniform to fetch the water, and he sat down across from them, setting The Boot on the chair next to him. "What brings you to Central City?"

Wells glared at him again and asked, "May I have my bag, please?" 

Joe opened it, checked for weapons – but found just a book and a lot of papers – and handed it over, hoping he wasn't making a mistake.

Harrison Wells pulled out the book and dumped it on the table. "This is what brings us here. Someone stole my name and my life."

 _Shit._ Joe stared at the thing. He didn't need to see the title.

Even without the dust jacket, without Harrison Wells' – no, Eobard Thawne's – no Harrison Wells' – face staring at him, he knew what it was. 

That damned biography.

"I found it a few months ago. Fascinating reading. Except that this is not me. Whoever this is about, he stole my life, my ideas. He – he …" Wells spluttered, practically vibrating in outrage. 

Tess tried to calm her husband. "Sweetheart, breathe. Just breathe."

Joe watched as Wells struggled to contain himself.

"Where are you from?" That seemed an innocuous enough question.

Tess answered, "Stuckeyville – it's a little town in Ohio. We own the local bowling alley there."

"I also teach physics." Wells muttered. "What does that have to do with anything? This – this impostor – stole my life! S.T.A.R. Labs was _our_ idea, he got hold of it somehow."

A knock on the door was a timely interruption. It was the uniformed officer returning with the promised pitcher of water and two cups. Joe poured water for both his guests, giving him a chance to gather his thoughts.

He waited for the Wells to drink, then asked "Have you lived there all of you lives?"

"Tess was born there. I wasn't."

"You're from?" 

"I was born in Wilmington, in Delaware. We moved to Starling City after we finished our degrees."

That jibed with the information he'd been able to dig up on the original Wells – the son of privileged bankers and lawyers who'd parted ways with his family to pursue a career in the hard sciences.

"And how did you end up in Steubenville?"

"Stuckyville." Wells looked at his hands, at the ceiling, at everywhere but at Joe or his wife. "I screwed up and my career imploded. I – we – decided that academics and research wasn't our what our future would be."

Tess picked up the story. "So we went home, settled down and made a new life for ourselves."

"When? When did you move to … Stuckeyville?" Joe thought the name was far too silly for the situation.

Tess answered, "About fifteen years ago. Why? Why are you asking all of these questions?"

Wells chimed in, "And why did those people out there think I'm dead. Why did they point guns at us?" 

Joe scrubbed his face, actually wishing he was dealing with a mass outbreak from Iron Heights instead of having to explain things to a not-dead man and his not-dead wife. "It's complicated. Very, very complicated. And frankly, I'm really not the best one to explain everything." He wasn't. He needed Barry, at the very least. And probably the other Wells, unfortunately. Pity Martin Stein wasn't available – there was no one better with explanations of the impossible.

Joe sighed. "We need to take a short ride. You okay with that?"

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

For months, ever since he found that damn book, Harrison had felt out of sync with everything, with the world, even with Tess. It was like his skin didn't fit anymore. He taught, but there was no passion there. Even when he'd started out, even when he'd had the reputation of being the biggest ass in the entire school, even when he could make his students pee in their pants with one raised eyebrow, he still had a passion for the subject.

But it was gone – stolen from him and he didn't know how to get it back.

"Sweetheart?" Tess held his hand as they sat in the back of the detective's sedan. "Just take it easy. _You_ are Harrison Wells, not this – " She made a face and waved her hand at the book he couldn't let go of, "imposter. You are the man I love, you will always be that man. Tomorrow, we'll go back home and we burn that damn book and start living our lives again. _Our lives_."

Harrison nodded and rested his head against Tess' shoulder. "What have I ever done to deserve you, Tess Morgan?"

"You exist, Harrison Wells. You live, you breathe, and you love. That's all that counts."

"You've given up so much for me."

"I've given up nothing that matters, you know that."

Harrison wasn't so sure of that, but he couldn't say so. Not in the back seat of a police sedan, on his way to god-knows-where. "I love you, whatever happens – never forget that I love you."

Tess squeezed his hand. "As if I could. I love you, Harrison. More now than ever."

From the front, Harrison heard Detective West make a phone call. "Barry – you need to get over to the lab, now. I'm on my way. And when you get there, tell everyone they need to remain calm."

He couldn't hear the other side of the conversation, which was a pity.

"No, Bar – not a meta problem. Not really - I think. But just get over there and wait for me – in soft clothes, okay. I'm bringing some people you need to meet. See you in a few." Detective West glanced up and Harrison caught his eye in the rearview mirror.

When it was clear that the detective had disconnected from the call, Harrison asked, "Who are we meeting?"

"Just some people who can answer your questions better than I can."

"You seem nervous about this."

"I am, believe me."

"Is it because everyone thinks I'm dead?"

"In part. There are other complications."

"I feel like I'm caught in a very bad science fiction movie."

"Oh, believe me, Dr. Wells – it's worse than that."

Tess just squeezed his hand, and then she let go as the car turned off the main road and they passed through a gate. "Harrison, look!"

He did. "Stop the car, Detective."

To his surprise, the man did. He even let them get out and stare at the building. The vast, ruined building.

"He really did build it. That bastard built S.T.A.R. Labs." Harrison fished through his bag and pulled out a copy of the sketch he'd made so many years ago. "See – see – he stole it from me!"

The cop didn't even look at the sketch, he just nodded. 

Harrison wanted to know why the man believed him, but he knew that the answers he was seeking were inside the building. He took Tess' hand and they got back into the car for the remainder of this short trip to a stolen destiny.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Barry hadn't been at work when Joe called. It had been a quiet day in a quiet week, and he'd finished up his reports a little after two. Captain Singh, perhaps in appreciation for the past week's lack of tardiness, or perhaps understanding his somewhat broken heart, let him clock out a few hours early.

There seemed to be a lull in meta-human activity, for which he was unutterably grateful. In the weeks since Zoom's appearance here, since he'd nearly destroyed him, they hadn't encountered another breacher. He didn't know why, and at this point, he couldn't care. It was just nice to have a respite. A chance to rest, to reset, to find a way to cope with all the crap that life had dealt the last few months. Of course, he still needed to figure out how to capture and defeat Zoom, how to get Harry's daughter back. Which was why he couldn't take the night off and was going to head to S.T.A.R. Labs in a while. 

Right now, though, he wanted to enjoy the free time, take just a few hours for himself and not be The Flash, not be the dumped boyfriend.

He'd thought about heading over to Saints & Sinners, the bar that Len Snart frequented. It seemed like a good place to escape the world for a couple of hours. But then Joe called and told him he needed to get to S.T.A.R. Labs. That something was up.

Barry hated when Joe got all mysterious, but it wasn't like he could really complain, since he got mysterious on a weekly, if not daily basis with Joe, who knew just who and what he was. 

He whooshed into the Cortex and found Caitlin and Cisco at their usual stations. Harry was – thankfully – somewhere else, and so was Jay. 

"Hey there, wasn't expecting you until later." Cisco commented. "What's up?"

"Joe asked me to meet him here. Did he contact either of you?"

Caitlin shook her head. "No – all's quiet."

Barry sighed and shook his head. "Well, I guess we'll find out soon enough." 

Sure enough, five minutes later, Joe came in. Alone. "Great, you're all here."

Cisco pulled the ever-present lollipop out of his mouth and asked, "Do we need to get Harry? He's in my workroom, _again_." He sighed in annoyance.

"No – probably not a good idea. Not yet, at least."

"Joe? What's going on?" That had Barry worried. He had so many issues with the Earth-2 version of Harrison Wells, but he didn't like the idea of excluding him from anything that involved potential meta-human activity.

Joe held up a hand, "Just, just hold on." He disappeared and Barry could hear him talking with someone – two people, actually. A man, with an almost disturbingly familiar tenor, and a woman. Both sounded querulous, curious. 

Barry looked over at Cisco and Caitlin. They had heard the voices, too, and were wearing matching looks of anxiety.

Joe came back, followed by Harrison Wells, who was clinging to Tess Morgan's hand. 

Silence reigned for a very long moment, until Cisco muttered, "Now I see why you didn't want Harry here."

"Who are you people?" That was Harrison's voice – or maybe Harry's. Not as smooth and soothing as the former's but not has hoarse and desperate as the latter's.

Joe made the introductions. "Cisco Ramon, Dr. Caitlin Snow, Barry Allen – this is Harrison Wells and his wife, Tess Morgan. The real Harrison Wells. From this Earth."

Wells – or whoever he was – reared back as if he'd been slapped. 

Caitlin shook her head. "That's not possible. You know that."

"What do you mean, 'From this Earth'?" Wells demanded.

Barry ignored the question and circled around the pair. The woman – Tess – seemed nervous, as she clung to her husband's hand. The man – if he really was the real Harrison – quivered with barely suppressed emotion.

Joe said, "Barry – I was hoping you could explain what's going on. I think I understand it, but I'm not a theoretical physicist."

"Neither am I."

"At least you majored in physics. And you've been Ground Zero for some pretty strange things the last eighteen months."

Harrison cut them off. "Enough with the banter. Will someone _please_ tell us what's going on?"

Before Barry could say anything, Cisco said, with typical bluntness, "Well, you both died fifteen years ago."

"Um, clearly not. As you can see, we're very much alive." Harrison looked like he was about to punch Cisco. He turned to Joe, "You promised us answers."

Joe waved a hand at Barry, giving him the floor.

Barry took a deep breath and tried to figure out a way to explain the mess. "Okay, okay. Here's the condensed version. Fifteen years ago, a man named Eobard Thawne – a time traveler from the future – murdered my mother and tried to kill me. A few months later, he caused a car crash that killed your wife." At Tess' gasp, Barry gave her an apologetic smile and turned back to Wells. "You survived, but just for a little while. This man from the future stole your DNA and your face and your memories and killed you. He used your memories to build this place with the sole intention of causing a catastrophic accident in the particle accelerator, which would release masses of dark matter. Which, in turn, would create meta-humans with amazing powers. Actually, that was simply a side effect; he did it to create meta-human powers in me – to give me super speed. He needed to harness that speed to create a time rift that would allow him to return home – in the future." Barry felt like he'd just run from New York to Los Angeles and back, twice.

And of course, Wells didn't believe him. "You are insane."

"No, not really. You are alive now, but you weren't for the last fifteen years." Barry debated giving the Wells a demonstration of his speed, but decided not to. There were only so many impossible things he could expect someone to believe in in such a short time without going bonkers.

Harrison shook his head. "No – you are definitely insane. All of you."

Barry continued. "We weren't able to stop your – " He searched for the right word, "murderer, until his ancestor – Joe's partner – killed himself. Eddie's death broke the timeline and wiped the false Harrison Wells from existence. But that didn't undo everything that happened, it didn't un-create this place, it didn't un-create me or the other meta-humans. Time just didn't unravel."

He waited for another outburst from Harrison, but it didn't come. Instead, the man let go of his wife's hand and sank into a chair. "Time. It's not linear. It's not even like a looped ball of string. Time is a many-stranded knot. You tug one line, others tighten and others unravel. That was my doctoral thesis."

"That's what's happened here. I don't know how to prove to you that your existence was – interrupted. But it was."

"I think we can." Cisco, ever helpful, offered. 

"You want to vibe them?" Barry asked, a little surprised, since Cisco rarely liked to use his powers.

"Nah, don't think I have to - and that wouldn't prove anything to _them_. We need objective evidence, and I'm pretty sure I know how we can do that."

Joe asked the question on Barry's lips, "How do you plan on performing this miracle?

Cisco grinned. "We check the Internet Wayback Machine. It caches copies of web pages. If, as you say, time is a knot, it's possible that there are still some knots in the Wells' timeline. But the question is, have you done anything that would merit the Internet's attention? Something noteworthy? A paper published in an academic journal, maybe?"

Harrison gave a bitter laugh. "I've been living a very quiet life for the last decade and a half. Teaching high school physics in Stuckeyville, helping Tess with the bowling alley. No academic papers, no scientific breakthroughs."

"But you have students who've made names for themselves," Tess said. "Look up finalists in the Intel Science Talent Search for the last few years. Harrison's a brilliant teacher and he's coached dozens of students in the competition. That would be on the Internet, certainly."

Barry held his breath as Cisco and Caitlin worked at their stations. 

Caitlin got the first part, "According to the current ISTS website, Harrison Wells is listed as the advisor for two finalists from Stuckeyville this year. Let me see if I can find anything from prior years." Caitlin dug a little deeper and found the listings for the last decade.

Meanwhile, Cisco had luck with the Wayback Machine. "And here is the cache from the ISTS site from fifteen months ago, before Eddie killed himself. Nothing about any finalists from Stuckeyville. And from eighteen months ago." He kept clicking. "And the last page they have cached is from four years ago – nada on Stuckeyville." He turned the screen so everyone could see.

Barry didn't know if he wanted to declare this paradox solved on such circumstantial evidence. Not when there was something a hell of a lot more conclusive in one of the sub-basements. "I think we need to check the cold storage."

Joe knew just what he was talking about. "I thought you were going to take it back to Star City and give it a proper burial?"

"Never got the chance, and frankly I kind of forgot about it. With everything."

"It? What's in cold storage?" Harrison, for the first time, sounded frightened.

Barry felt a surge of pity for him, for both of them. He couldn't bring himself to answer; no one else could, either.

But Wells connected the dots. "My body? You found my body? How did you know it was mine?" Panic coated every word.

Caitlin explained, "We had DNA – from the man we thought was Harrison Wells. It was a match for the corpse."

"The DNA from the murderous time-traveling impostor."

"Yeah."

Tess laughed softly. "I feel like Alice in Wonderland, being told she should practice believing in impossible things."

Barry wasn't sure he wanted to take the Wells through S.T.A.R. Labs – they were bound to have questions he didn't want to answer. Not yet, maybe not ever. But it didn't seem right not to let them be there when he opened the body bag. "Shall we?"

The entire contingent followed him down, into the bowels of the building, past the ruined accelerator ring, the entrance to the Pipeline, and the room with the wormhole, to the cold storage unit – powered by the same tech that Cisco used to create Cold's gun. There were way too many bodies here – almost all of the meta-humans that he'd killed or had died in Central City – Tony Woodward and Farooq Gibran, Hannibal Bates and Russell Glosson, who'd died of an aneurism a day after he was captured.

Barry held his breath as he pulled open the drawer with Harrison Wells' remains. The body bag was almost, but not quite flat. Which didn't mean anything. His hands were shaking as he reached for the zipper – they were shaking so hard he couldn't pull the tab down. Caitlin came to his rescue and covered his hand with hers. Together, they unzipped the black plastic bag.

It was empty. No desiccated corpse, no bones, not even a speck of dust. 

Caitlin picked up the bag and turned it over, "I bet if I swabbed the inside of this, all I'd get is residue from the plastic. Not a speck of DNA." 

Cisco did something that Barry didn't expect. He stuck his hand in the bag and closed his eyes. "Nope, nothing. Nada."

Wells ignored that performance, took the bag from Cisco and folded it up. He dropped it on the shelf and closed the drawer. "Of course there's nothing there. I'm alive, damn it." He pulled the identification label off, " I don't think you need this anymore."

Barry took the label – "H. Wells – recovered from County Road J, near Starling City" – and stuck it in his pocket. Just one more impossible thing to believe in before breakfast.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Harry muttered to himself as he wrote and erased yet another set of calculations. It was too quiet, but whatever music he played annoyed him. He found himself wishing for company – Snow or Ramon or Barry. He'd never admit it, but they impressed the hell out of him. It wasn't just their individual intelligence – which was stunning – it was how they worked together. They were a perfect team, balancing and supporting and helping each other in complete harmony. 

He envied them. In his professional career, the only person who'd come close to that was Tess. Even though her brilliance outshone him by orders of magnitude, she anchored him; she made him better, wiser, gentler. They'd built S.T.A.R. Labs together and while he could never, ever, ever regret Jesse, he regretted Tess' decision to focus on motherhood. Maybe if she'd continued working at the lab, she'd still be alive. 

_No, no – that line of thinking was flawed, a fatal loop._

He tried to focus on the equations on the board, but it was impossible. He'd been at it for hours, days, and he needed a break. Maybe he'd head into the Cortex and taunt Cisco. That was always fun. The kid had finally stopped flinching every time they were in close physical proximity and was learning to give as good as he got. 

Pity that he couldn't say the same for Barry. Despite the fact that Barry Allen didn't kill him on sight, had unthinkingly saved him from his foster-father's bullets, and generally seemed to accept his guidance, the young man could rarely meet his eyes. Barry reminded him of a badly beaten dog – one that wanted to trust, but was too broken to get past the fear. 

Harry told himself that it wasn't his problem, what had happened here wasn't his fault or his job to fix, but he couldn't help but see the other man's pain, understand how the losses mounted. When Tess died, he had wanted to retreat from everything, shut the door on the world. But he had Jesse, his child, and she needed him. That made all the difference. He could be a bastard to the rest of the world, but he was a father who loved his daughter more than life itself.

Thinking about Jesse brought all the rage he'd been barely keeping under control back to a rolling boil. And rage was dangerous. Better to be cold and calculating and in control.

Which brought him back to the original problem. He needed a distraction. If he couldn't torment the gang in the Cortex, maybe he could find that coward, Jay, and pound his face into a bloody pulp.

Harry capped his marker and tossed it on the desk, ignoring the slight clatter as it rolled onto the floor. He was already out the door.

From the outer corridor, he could hear Joe West's voice. They'd come to something of a detente after Zoom nearly broke Barry and Cisco broke the news about Jesse. West understood his terror and his need, and while he clearly still hated him because of that damned imposter, he was a lot less overtly hostile these days. The covert hostility was still there, but Harry didn't have the feeling that Detective West was still two heartbeats from pumping a couple of bullets in him.

In addition to Joe, he could hear Cisco and Barry, but there was another voice. Harry listened and tried to identify it. Definitely male, curious and a bit agitated – middle aged, from middle America. Pity he couldn't hear the actual words. 

Harry debated by-passing the Cortex and having to greet the stranger, but he was curious. Indulging his curiosity might be just he needed – a chance to get out of his head for a little while. Besides, no one said he had to be nice to the man.

A small, quiet voice – an echo of the man he'd once been, before fame and money and tragedy hardened all his edges – reminded him that there was nothing wrong with being nice. Harry just ignored it.

He approached the entrance to the Cortex – close enough to hear the actual conversation now, but was careful to stay out of the line of sight.

 _"So, time is slowly unknotting."_ That was from one the strangers. _"What else is going to change?"_

Barry replied, _"That's impossible to predict. Thawne – the … time-traveler … was adamant that it was impossible to undo a catastrophe. Problems would manifest in other ways."_

 _"Except he was a liar and a murderer and a master manipulator. Who's to say that he wasn't telling you what he wanted you to hear. To get him to do what he wanted."_ Joe added.

Why was Barry telling the stranger about Thawne? Cautious as well as curious, Harry continued to listen.

 _"That's possible. But I think he was telling the truth – or at least a version of it. Einstein believed that time is an illusion..."_ Barry's voice trailed off.

The stranger finished that thought, _"The separation between past, present, and future is only an illusion, although a convincing one. Or maybe it's all just entropy."_

Harry was getting bored listening. Time, illusion or not, was not his friend. He banged on the wall to announce his entrance before entering the Cortex.

Four faces looked up and to his shock, _all_ of them were familiar. Ramon, Joe West, Barry and a face he saw in the mirror every morning. "What the _hell_ is going on here?"

"I thought you said that the man who killed me was wiped out of existence."

Harry and this … doppelganger … spoke simultaneously. Then the man got out of his chair and lunged for him, fists clenched. Harry felt a surge of pure joy – it looked like he was going to get the fight he wanted after all.

Except that this time, Barry didn't wait for anyone to start a fistfight. He zipped between him and this other him, and Harry found himself pinned against the wall. "Harry, no."

"I wasn't the one about to throw the first punch."

"But you would have enjoyed hitting back way too much."

He had to laugh. "True." Barry stepped back and Harry held up his hands. The joy of incipient violence was replace by another sort of joy – that of a scientist seeing a theory proven true. His face almost ached as muscles stretched into a broad smile.

Harry quickly noted the differences in this other him – he was a lot softer around the edges. A runner's body, but slightly gone to seed. Hair a touch more gray at the temples – and quite a bit longer than his own. Eyes were the same blue, but the glasses were frameless. And he was wearing colors – an ancient gray sweater with patches on the elbows, a blue shirt and well-faded jeans. Clothes he'd never consider putting on his body. He let his smile grow broader and said, "Hello, me."

"He's not you, Harry." Cisco said with a note of snide triumph. "This is the real Harrison Wells. The one that should have built S.T.A.R. Labs."

"Ah – that's why you were talking about time unknotting itself." At everyone's startled glance, he added, "I was listening for a bit."

His un-murdered counterpart said, "So, you understand what's going on?"

"Very much so. Because Thawne was unmade, you were never killed. Therefore, you're alive. Makes sense to me."

"But if you're not this time-traveling body snatcher, who are you?"

Harry turned to the rest of the room. "I guess you didn't bother to explain about the singularity and the portals and the multi-verse, did you."

Barry shrugged. "There are only so many impossible things you can expect someone to accept in a single day."

"Huh?"

"They don't have _Alice in Wonderland_ on Earth-2?"

"No, I don't think so."

"Earth-2? What do you mean? Is there another Earth?" This other Wells didn't sound distressed at all. Eager, excited, and Harry knew that feeling all too well. If he wasn't so jaded and bitter and worried, he might share this man's joy.

Cisco continued playing his role as the inconvenient exposition monkey. "We have a wormhole in the basement that leads to another Earth. This dick decided to come for a visit."

"Yes, Cisco – I just decided I wanted a change of scenery. I thought that leaving my perfectly operating and fully staffed laboratory and coming to this shit hole was the ideal choice for a vacation."

"You have a wormhole in the basement? Is that an ordinary thing here? Does everyone in this place have one?" The other version of him now had a touch of hysteria in his voice.

"No, not really." Harry was starting to get bored with this conversation. "Look, I'm sorry your life got interrupted, but we have things to do here, important things. Maybe you can come back for the full tour on another day."

"Harry, you know you're not in charge here."

"Ramon, shut the fuck … " The clatter of footsteps interrupted him. And the woman walking into the Cortex stole his breath. And then his sanity.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Tess was feeling a little off balance. No, _a lot_ off balance. Over the past few months, since Harrison found that terrible book, she'd watch him slowly start to disintegrate. It wasn't like the time when he'd faced academic disgrace, when accusations of incompetence and plagiarism and falsifying research had tanked his career. She knew that those accusations weren't true, that her husband was the victim of a vendetta by small-minded people too scared of what Harrison was trying to create.

She had supported his decision not to fight the review board, to retreat from academics and build another life. Maybe if they hadn't settled back in her hometown, she might never have been so content, so happy with a life she'd never planned on.

But then Harrison found that damn biography and he became consumed by thoughts of finding the imposter. She tried to help, but there seemed to be nothing about this other Harrison Wells on the Internet, nothing that seemed credible. The name wasn't common, but it wasn't unique either. She'd found reports of a confession to a lurid murder by a Harrison Wells but other than that, there were no photos, no news articles, none of the scientific papers that had been mentioned in the book. 

What was even stranger was that the book itself really didn't seem to exist. It had a Library of Congress catalogue number and an International Standard Book Number, but when they looked those up, the reports said "number not assigned." 

She had tried to convince Harrison that it was just some incredible hoax, but he wouldn't believe her. He was adamant that this imposter was real – he knew too much about him, about S.T.A.R. Labs, about theories and ideas he'd never published. It _couldn't_ be a hoax.

Tess had read the book and she had to agree. There was just too many of her husband's secret dreams contained in those pages.

When it got too much to bear, she told Harrison, "I think the only way to solve this mystery is to go to Central City – where this imposter is supposed to be. Maybe we can confront him?"

Harrison liked the idea, but he had ideas of his own. "If he's me – doesn't he have my social security number? Is he really an identity thief? Or is this something more?"

She wasn't happy with the idea of confronting a total stranger and exposing him as a fraud, and suggested an alternative. "Maybe we should go to the police first? Doesn't it seem strange that someone with such an extensive biography – six hundred pages worth – doesn't have a single news article written about him?"

"Yes, it does. You're right, let's go to the police. Maybe they already know he's an imposter."

The trip had to wait for a few months. Harrison couldn't just take off for a few days, but with the decision to go hunt down the imposter, her husband seemed to calm down a bit. He was still agitated, but nothing that a glass of good red wine with dinner couldn't settle. Thanksgiving and Christmas passed in a blur. Although her parents were long gone, she still had cousins scattered around the Stuckeyville area and they'd find it very strange if she and Harrison decamped to points unspecified during the holidays.

But mid-winter break came at last, a time when the two of them would usually go out of town for a few days. She'd mentioned heading to Chicago to a few of her friends, a destination that didn't set the small town grapevine abuzz. 

The drive to Central City took a day and a half. They'd stopped overnight in St. Louis and reached the small metropolis a little before five in the afternoon. The plan was to go to the police and make some polite inquiries. They hadn't expected to be greeted with guns drawn and whispers of "dead man walking."

At least the nice detective seemed inclined to believe them. But then things got weird. Weirder than a book written about a version of her husband than never existed. They were taken to a place that looked far too much like the building Harrison had sketched out all those years ago, except it was almost ruined. But not abandoned.

The people inside were strange. Smart, but strange. The story of a murderous time traveler seemed the height of insanity, but the pieces began to make sense. 

Time was untangling.

It hurt her head to realize that maybe she and Harrison _had_ died coming home from that trip to the beach, that the last fifteen years hadn't really ever happened. That Einstein and Feynman were right, that time was an illusion. She certainly understood the theory behind it, but it was so personal that it couldn't be _just_ a theory.

After they had looked at the empty corpse bag, Tess turned to the young doctor who'd provided such helpful information. "Do you think you could show me to a ladies room, or someplace quiet for a few minutes."

Harrison looked at her with concern. "Tess, are you all right?"

"Just need a few moments, love. I'll be fine." She kissed Harrison and he wrapped his arms around her. Suddenly, for the first time in months, it felt like she had her husband back. 

"Come with me." The woman led her into a small, private medical bay. "Would you like something cold to drink? A cup of tea? Coffee? A snack?"

Tess recognized what the offer was – a delaying mechanism. "Some water will be fine, Dr. Snow."

"Call me Caitlin, please."

"Thank you, Caitlin."

The woman – little more than a girl, to her middle-aged eyes – came back with the promised bottle of water. She seemed very sad, very wary and Tess had to ask, "What did he do to you?"

"Who?"

She gave the girl a look.

Caitlin smiled sadly. "The particle accelerator accident that Thawne engineered transformed the man who became my husband. A year later, he died saving this city from another disaster that Thawne created. But it's more than that …" Caitlin shook her head. "He broke the trust of everyone here. Me, Cisco, Barry. He was brilliant and charismatic, but there was a kindness, too. He encouraged us to be better people and we loved him, but it was all a lie. He was evil, a murderer, like something out of a storybook, something that shouldn't have been real. But he was."

Tess felt her heart break. "You poor child. All of you. But why stay here? What are you doing? Are you still cleaning up this man's messes?"

"In a way. When Thawne died, he was trying to return to the future. It opened a singularity – a rift that would swallow the universe. That's how Ronnie died, helping close it. But there were residual … problems."

"Wormholes? Small ones scattered around the city?"

Caitlin looked startled.

"I am – or I was – a physicist, too, my dear. It all makes sense. Apparently you had a major quantum event here, and even though you were able to close it, the material fabric of the universe was damaged. But there's something else that you're not telling me, isn't there?"

Caitlin wouldn't look at her, but Tess wasn't going to be put off. "My dear? What other impossible thing am I going to have to believe in today?"

"One of those wormholes is a portal to another Earth. There's another version of your husband here."

"Ah. And is there another version of me here, too?"

Caitlin shook her head. "I don't even know if this Dr. Wells is married – although he does have a daughter."

The girl clamped her mouth shut but this time, Tess didn't continue to pry. "I think I need to rejoin my husband." She wondered if she should ask for an introduction to this alternate version of Harrison and decided against it. Things were getting far too confusing.

But it seemed that she was going to meet the man anyway. She followed Caitlin back to the lab's control center and found both her husband and this other doppelganger. And from the look on Harrison's double's face, it seemed like he knew her, too.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

"Tess." Struck through the heart, Harry uttered that single, perfect syllable and fell to his knees, utterly broken.

When he crossed over from his world, he'd been prepared to find his counterpart, although he'd been surprised to discover just how closely the lives had mirrored each other. But the Earth-1's version of Harrison Wells was dead and he hadn't cared that the man was really a time traveling body snatcher, except to the extent that the son of a bitch's legacy of murder and mistrust was interfering with his own needs.

Still, he should have expected this when he'd first laid eyes on his not-so-dead and badly dressed Earth-1 counterpart. If Thawne's unmaking resulted in Harrison Wells' un-dying, then of course his wife would not have died, either. Maybe if he'd paid more attention to what the team tried to tell him, instead of brushing them off in his urgency to recruit them for the fight against Zoom, he might have been better prepared for this moment. 

She – Tess – looked at him with sad eyes, but there was no love there, nothing but curiosity and maybe a touch of pity. She didn't approach him; instead, she went to her husband and let him wrap his arms around her.

The urge to do violence to his counterpart was sickening and he closed his eyes against the rage that was turning his world to red. Not even the drive to get Jesse back was this bad.

Then peace came - a hand on his head, his shoulder, his cheek. Harry opened his eyes and found Tess kneeling before him.

"We were the same?"

He nodded, his mouth too dry for words.

"I'm so sorry. So very sorry."

He couldn't bear the sympathy in her eyes, but he couldn't look away and his brain catalogued the changes that time had wrought. This Tess had settled comfortably into healthy middle age – her once blonde hair now streaked with gray; her laugh lines had deepened, and there was a touch of fullness around her chin. But she was still beautiful, still the woman who had taken his heart and nurtured his soul. The only person who had the power to make him a better man.

No. She was not. She was not his Tess. His Tess had died of a disease beyond the reach and skill of any doctor. His Tess was broken and gone and no interference in time could bring her back. Breath by breath, Harry rebuilt the stone walls that guarded his heart

"Harrison?" Tess smiled gently. "Are you all right?"

He got to his feet and some long-forgotten lessons in gallant behavior compelled his to offer this woman a hand. She took it and squeezed it briefly before letting go. Harry ached as Tess stood before him, a memory of an impossible dream. All he could say was, "Call me Harry."

Her smile broadened. "That a difference. My husband hates when people call him that."

In truth, he did too – but here, on this Earth, it seemed to work better for everyone. "You need to go home – wherever that is. Both of you." He couldn't be bothered to smooth out the urgency in his tone.

The other him asked – his tone half-serious, half-joking, "Why? Will some cataclysmic event happen because we're both in the same room?"

He snapped, "No, don't be stupid. It doesn't work like that. We are _not_ the same people." 

Tess, though, smiled. "You might be from an alternate world, but you really are not so different from my husband. He, too, has trouble tolerating foolishness."

"Listen to me, you have to go home, forget about what you've learned, forget about us. Go live your lives like you were supposed to. This is a dangerous place and the longer you stay here, the greater the chance that you'll get hurt. Or worse." He flicked his gaze over to Tess' husband. "Both of you." He didn't have to close his eyes to see his alternate ripped apart by Zoom, to see Tess equally destroyed. He was too close to caring, and as soon as that happened, these innocents would die.

Tess and Harrison looked to the others in the room for verification. Harry was gratified to see that everyone nodded.

Harrison asked, "Can you at least tell us why?"

"No, I can't. And even though you have no reason to trust me, you have to." Desperate, he added a word he rarely used, "Please." 

Barry came forward and added his own plea of urgency. "Harry's right – there are things happening here that could put you both in terrible danger. You need to go home as soon as possible. Go back to your lives and forget about this."

Harry ached to know the details of the lives that that Thawne had interrupted, but they'd only be a distraction - something he could ill-afford. 

Joe gathered the Wells and led them out of the Cortex and Harry was grateful for the detective's warm and nurturing personality. He tried to look away as Tess walked out of his life forever, but he couldn't. 

Harrison, though, paused and turned around, pulling something from his satchel. "I never want to see this again." He dropped a book on the floor and Harry didn't have to see the title to know what it was. 

That damn biography.

Harrison met his eyes and Harry nodded. They were in perfect understanding.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Barry glanced over at his comrades; Caitlin had her hand over her mouth, to stifle a sob, and Cisco's eyes were suspiciously damp. Harry was stone-faced and silent as he stalked out of the Cortex, kicking the book into a corner.

Whatever conflicted feelings he had about that man suddenly seemed so unfair. He couldn't keep hating, couldn't keep blaming Harry for what Thawne did. Maybe it was the part of him that still believed in the good in people, but for the first time, he found himself seeing Harry Wells as a real person, not a cruel trick of fate wearing the face of a man he'd loved and then hated.

In the wake of the Wells' departure, of Harry's, too, no one moved, no one said a thing, until Caitlin spoke. "Barry – go to him. He shouldn't be alone."

If his unbreakable belief in the good in people had a counterpart, it was Caitlin's endless well of compassion. He nodded and headed down towards Cisco's workroom. Harry was sitting at the desk, staring at a monitor displaying a swirling pattern of red and yellow streamers chasing each other and dissolving into a shower of sparks. One of Cisco's poorer jokes.

Harry must have heard him come in, but he didn't acknowledge his presence. 

"I'm sorry."

"For what?" An hour ago, those two words would have been pulsing with belligerence, dripping with contempt. Now, there were soft, defeated.

"For everything. For Jesse, for your Tess. For letting you suffer alone."

Harry spun around. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Barry remembered the words he'd spoken a few weeks ago, words that Harry didn't hear. "We've all had a hard time getting past … the past. Me, more than the others."

"And what just happened changed that? Why?" 

Some of the old belligerence was back, but Barry wasn't put off. "As Cisco likes to say, you're a dick. But you’re also a smart man, and you have to know that it's easier to catch flies with honey than with vinegar."

"I understand that my counterpart here – excuse me, the imposter – was a really smooth talker. Didn't think that approach would go over too well."

"Which you didn't know until we told you. For some reason, you chose to deliberately antagonize everyone here, but now I know why. You even gave me a clue a few days ago, but I was not particularly inclined to listen to you then."

"I did?"

"You said that if Zoom finds out who I care for, who I love, who I live for, he'll take them from me. That I have to keep the people I love as far away from me as possible. You weren't just offering advice, you were speaking from personal experience. You told Tess and Harrison to go home because you don't want Zoom to find them. You keep us at arm's length because you don't want Zoom to know you care. You don't want us to get hurt." Barry smiled, then added, "Any more than we have to."

"Do you have a degree in psychology as well as physics and chemistry, Mr. Allen?"

"No, and I'm occasionally a little slow on the uptake. But we are a team. The _four_ of us."

"Snow's already given me that speech. That's why I stayed here."

"But you're still not part of the team, Harry. You still hold yourself apart, now more than ever."

"What I said about Zoom and your girlfriend holds true for everyone in your life, Barry. Your family, your friends. He will take them from you."

"Only if I let him."

Harry gave him an irritated glare. "You're going to hang around my neck like an albatross until I agree, aren’t you?"

"Maybe more like a stray cat at your feet than a dead bird, but yeah." Barry leaned against the desk, hands in his pockets, waiting.

"Zoom wants your speed."

"We know that."

"He'll return my daughter to me if I make you faster, help you realize your potential. He let me see Jesse on Christmas Eve, he forced my hand." Harry covered his eyes with a hand. "I'm sorry."

Barry didn't say anything.

"Still want me on your 'team', Mr. Allen?"

"Of course. Someone's got to fatten me up like a Christmas goose." Before Harry could say anything, Barry added, "Cisco vibed the whole thing. Saw you and Zoom and Jesse in the rail yard. He felt your terror and your anguish. He knows you don't want to do it - _we_ know you don't want to do it. We'll get her back, Harry. Believe in that like you believe in nothing else."

Barry actually enjoyed watching the myriad of expressions fly across Harry's face – fear and shock and shame and finally, hope.

He stood up and offered Harry his hand. "Come on, let's go grab some dinner."

Harry's palm was just a little damp, as was his smile. "Big Belly Burger?"

"Nah, not tonight. In the mood for some mu-shu and sweet and sour pork. You like Chinese?"

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Harrison smiled at his reflection. Actually, he smiled at Tess' reflection. She had hugged him from behind and rested her chin on his shoulder. 

"Have I mentioned how much I love how you look in a tux, Dr. Wells?"

"A few times, Mrs. Wells, a few." When he brought the suit home and reluctantly modeled it for her, she barely gave him a chance to get it off before she jumped his bones.

"I'm going to have a very hard time making it through the ceremony tonight." Tess bit her lip and fluttered her eyelashes at him. "Watching you up on that stage, giving your speech. Knowing that when you come home …" His wife had such a wicked look in her eye.

Harrison completed the sentence, full of innuendo. "I'm going to come … home."

Tess laughed; the sound was like a ringing bell. She pulled away and swatted his ass. "Get out of here before I put some wrinkles in your suit."

Harrison left their bedroom and went into his office. The stack of index cards with his speech was right where he left it.

He sat down and turned to face the window. It was a little after seven and the sun was still shining – it was a perfect June evening. Graduation was tomorrow, but tonight was awards ceremony for the departing seniors and for the teaching staff. Two weeks ago, to his great shock, Stuckeyville High's principal, Hal Godfrey, told him he was getting the coveted Teacher of the Year award. And in all his time as principal, Hal had said that no teacher had ever gotten more votes than he had this year.

Once, he might have scoff at such honors, once he might have told Godfrey to take his name off the list and never include it again. But once, he was an ass and an oaf who couldn't see beyond his lost dreams.

"You ready?"

Harrison looked up. Tess was wearing something spectacular – a gown in shimmering golds and blues that made her eyes glow. That made his heart pound and his mouth go dry. "Maybe I should have Phil give my speech and we should just stay home."

Tess chuckled. "That's a marvelous idea, but somehow I don't think our friends will be too happy with us."

"You're right. Obligations, obligations, obligations." He huffed out a pretend put-upon sigh.

To Harrison's surprise, he enjoyed the evening, seeing everyone dressed in their finery, listening to friends and co-workers gossip. He was particularly proud when Hal Godfrey announced that one of his students was a first prize medalist in the Global Good category of the Intel Science Talent Search. He'd advised many finalists over the years, but this was the first time that one of his students received a coveted medal.

Hal got back on stage, "And now for the final award of the evening." The microphone squealed and everyone winced. "Teacher of the Year. This teacher …" Hal started to blather and Harrison tuned him out.

But then Tess squeezed his hand and told him he had to get up, and Harrison felt the start of a flop sweat. He'd rehearsed his speech a dozen times, but frankly, he was still terrified. He ran through the words, he patted his jacket pocket, making sure he really did have his notecards, and all of a sudden, the sound of enthusiastic clapping erupted. Some of his students were even chanting his name…

_Dr. Wells, Dr. Wells, Dr. Wells!_

Harrison stood, gave Tess a panicked look and headed for the stage. Hal handed him the trophy and he glanced at the nameplate and nearly fell over. It read

_Teacher of the Year - 2016  
Dr. Harry "Harrison" Wells_

__

FIN

**Author's Note:**

> We really don't know much about Earth-2 Harrison's home life, other than his daughter, Jesse "Quick". Fanon has him married to Tess, same as Earth-1's Harrison, and there are many excellent fics which have her killed in a car accident. So, until we learn otherwise, I'm free to take liberties and kill off Earth-2 Tess by other means to serve the story.
> 
> Also, the Intel Science Talent Search is a real thing - I could have used the science competition that Felicity had won (mentioned by Eobard in _Going Rogue_ , the National Informative Technology Competition), but Felicity was 19 when she won and clearly not a high school student.
> 
> The Eleanor Roosevelt biographies are real too, so is the controversy about them.


End file.
